By Susan Stamper Brown

It is going to take more than recycling a worn-out message with shiny new paper and presenting it wearing wrinkly, dress-down clothes to attract the folks in flyover country.

Nevertheless, that’s what they did, when three has-beens, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and Elizabeth Warren arrived in rolled-up sleeves and wrinkled pants in Berryville, VA on July 24, to introduce their party’s new slogan, “A Better Deal.”

They were about as convincing as the Three Amigos.

Democrats’ “Better Deal” is about as new and exciting as the beautifully wrapped inflatable unicorn-horn hat you received during the white elephant gift exchange last year that you promptly put in the Salvation Army donation box.

Offering government handouts without regard for what happens in the future is not a good or better deal. It is a bad deal … a foolish deal … a failed deal, and more of the same kind of awful deal they have offered the American people since the Democrat Party succumbed to Progressivism. Their antics the past six months show they are not progressive. They are reactionary, conspiratorial and backwards.

Rather than take a long look in the mirror at who they have become, Democrats decided to re-wrap more of the same, hoping to hoodwink hardworking Americans into believing government freebies and socialism are good things.

That’s how Venezuelans were tricked. Everything was just dandy until the government ran out of food, medicine and toilet paper. In the U.K., poor little Charlie Gard’s parents discovered that government controlled “free” healthcare meant they lost the freedom of choice for their sweet baby’s life. The government made him die in hospice, not his home.

Even if Democrats had a better deal, it would never work while holding on to old behaviors. As Jesus said, you can’t pour new wine into old wineskins because “…the wine will burst the skins, and both the wine and the wineskins will be ruined.”

Marketing campaigns intended to rebrand a dying party won’t work in this anti-establishment era of Trump. Democrats (and establishment Republicans alike) need a new heart, not a new slogan.

“Too many Americans don’t know what we stand for,” said Schumer at the Democrats’ rollout. He’s wrong. Too many Americans know what Democrats stand for, and that’s the problem. Their problem.

Look at their leaders and you know for what they stand. Democrats chose Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN) to help lead the party as the DNC Deputy Chair. Ellison recently argued on NPR’s “Morning Edition” that Twitter should block President Trump. Apparently, Ellison has an issue with the First Amendment. And the Second Amendment. Back in 2012 on Real Time with Bill Maher, Maher said the Democrat Party should come out against the Second Amendment and Ellison responded, “I sure wish they would. I sure wish they would.”

And corruption. Former DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL) is currently entwined in a big IT scandal investigation which RNC Chair Ronna Romney McDaniel says involves obstruction “at every level, on something that affects, potentially our national security.” All this, after having to resign for rigging the 2016 presidential campaign against Bernie Sanders in favor of Hillary Clinton.

Way to go, Democrats!

In a nutshell, the Democrat Party stands against just about everything Americans in flyover country are for and it stands for just about everything they are against.

During the “Better Deal” rollout, Schumer said, “You look in the mirror and ask, what did we do wrong?”

It’s not what they did wrong. It’s who they have become. New slogans can’t fix that.

That’s why regular folks laughed at the new Democrat Party slogan that sounds an awful lot like a plagiarized Papa John’s pizza slogan: “A Better Deal: Better Jobs, Better Wages, Better Future.”

Will “A Better Deal” help Democrats?

Better try again.

Susan Stamper Brown is a nationally syndicated columnist. Contact her at writestamper@gmail.com.